It wasn’t just a run that ended St. Patrick’s glorious history last night, it was a blitz.

Gill St. Bernard’s scored 19 unanswered points in 7:10 that spanned part of the third quarter and most of the fourth period in a 63-45 triumph over St. Patrick in the quarterfinals of the ShopRite/NJSIAA Non-Public B South tournament in Gladstone.

St. Patrick (16-10), No. 13 in The Star-Ledger Top 20, had taken a 34-32 lead on a put-back from Daniel Knight with 1:15 left in the third before the scoring barrage by No. 5 Gill St. Bernard’s began.

Jaren Sina started it with a patented 3-pointer that provided the Knights with a lead, 35-34, they never lost. The junior guard scored five in the outburst, Larry Piretra contributed six of his team-high 16 points and 6-7 center Dom Hoffman ran the floor with abandon, adding four points.

The huge run was a departure from the first half when St. Patrick led 28-25. The Elizabeth was school was able to grab the advantage without its big man and leading scorer, 6-7 DeAndre Bembry, who was in uniform but on the bench with an ankle sprain he suffered a week ago. Bembry tried to make a go of it in the middle of the big Gill St. Bernard’s surge, but managed to stay on the court just 30 seconds.

The Celtics came out in a form of a triangle-and-two defense that surprised the Knights. It was vintage tight-fisted defense from St. Patrick that limited Hoffman and Sina to just five points apiece.

“The first half was very physical,” said Gill St. Bernard’s coach Mergin Sina, who is Jaren's father. “I thought we played solid, but they did a good job of pushing us out of our comfort zone. The second half I told the guys the way we’re going to win the game is defensively.

“By us making six, seven, eight stops in a row (in the second half) got us momentum and we obviously got some baskets off it. Everybody thinks of us as an offensive team, we’re a pretty good defensive one, too.”

The Knights went to the line just four times in the first half. That scenario changed in the fourth quarter when Sina’s team converted 12 of 18 shots from the line. St. Patrick was just 4 of 6 from the stripe for the night.

“We weren’t physical in the first half,” said Mergin Sina. “We were letting guys drive by us. We had two guys with one foul each at halftime. When you only have two fouls at halftime, someone’s not being aggressive.”

Although it was St. Patrick that knocked Gill St. Bernard’s out of the state tournament last year in the sectional semifinals, Sina felt sad that this was the last game for these players at one of the most storied programs in state history due the closing of the school at the end of the school year.

“I feel horrible,” said coach Sina. “You win a game like this and you’re happy for your team, but there’s another team over there. Those kids now are probably trying to figure out where they’re going to school next year. I hated the fact that it would be us that eliminated them, It’s a bitter-sweet victory.”